76. Megan
Chapter 76
Megan
Ollie’s van is gone, as are half of his belongings. He never kept a huge amount of stuff here, and I can’t tell if this is just him getting prepared, or if this is it.
Would he really leave without saying goodbye?
I can’t imagine him doing that, but I know he’s hurting, too. Why drag it out and make it more painful than it already is? He’s probably even more desperate to get on the road now, and if I’m honest, I need him to go so I can have a proper cry without feeling like he’ll hear me.
Lately, I’ve been playing a meditation podcast when I feel like crying, but it doesn’t work. No amount of mindfulness, yoga, hot baths, or facemasks will make this feeling go away.
I need a big shake-up, so to stop myself curtain-twitching like a woman waiting for her husband to come home from the war, I throw my energy into rearranging my bedroom furniture.
Sleep has been impossible with him right on the other side of the wall, and it’ll be worse when all I hear is silence. I drag my bed into the middle of the room and attempt to rotate it, but it gets wedged in at an awkward angle. Soon I’m stuck in a gap between the frame and the wall. So much for being a strong and capable, independent woman.
Determined not to give up, I climb over the top and switch focus to my bedside table. When I pull out a drawer, my notebook stares back at me. The one where I wrote all my hopes and dreams for the year.
Perching on the edge of my bed, I leaf through the pages and pages of notes I made back on New Year’s Eve. This book was supposed to be my guide. It’s ironic to think that January began on such a high, only to come crashing down when Hattie moved out the very next day. Then Ollie appeared, and it’s been chaos ever since.
For all my attempts at manifesting my dream life, here I am six months later with even less of a clue about where my future is heading. I don’t really know who I am, or what I want, or what my purpose in life is anymore.
My goals list is so embarrassing, I have to close the book and shove it back in the drawer.
I will get promoted.
I will run a half-marathon.
I will have adventures with my friends.
I will fall in love.
Well, I’m not getting promoted, and I could count on zero hands the amount of times I’ve been for a run. I don’t even like running. Time with my friends has been reduced to monthly book club meetings, and I’ve skipped several to spend time with Ollie instead.
That last one hurts. I flop backwards and curl myself around a pillow that still smells like him. It’s already stained with last night’s tears. What’s a few more?
I’ve refused to let myself see it, but I’ve fallen so hard for Ollie. The universe has given me exactly what I wanted. A real love with a real man who loves me back. It just happens to be a classic case of right man, wrong time. Or right man, wrong lifetime.
Now he’s leaving, and I’ll be lonelier than ever, condemned to spend my evenings on the sofa eating pasta for one. Get the cats and let them eat me already.
I can’t believe this is what my life has come to. Alone and crying over a man in my empty flat. I don’t want to feel like this anymore. I need my friends, so I find my phone in the living room and sniff back the tears while firing off a text to our group chat.
Megan: Can you come over? Ollie is leaving and I’m a bit sad about it.
'A bit sad' is the understatement of the century. I’m not sure I’ve taken a full breath all day.
Hattie: I'm getting in the car.
Kara: Pick me up!